The flight from Taipei to Jakarta was reported to be the next one at 830am. The first flight was CI 5855 departing at 805am, arriving at 1205pm. There was another China Airlines flight scheduled for about 40 minutes later, which I don;t think the teams were on.

In examining after-the-fact the train options, they are identical to what we researched before-hand. Krabbe found the official Indonesian rail timetable (not partial ones like I was using before that). His work shows that the only departure from Gambir station close to 5pm was the KI Bima train departing at 1700 and arriving Yogyakarta at a middle-of-the-night 0047. Since teams did arrive in blackness, it could have been any time until 5am, but had logically to have been at 0047. From there the drive to teh Jomblang Caves would have left them many hours to kill before they could enter the Caves, but that would mean the equivalent of a Hours of Operation delay and the arrival of teams at Jomblang Caves did not appear to be very compact.

This is an exemplary case study of the complexity of air travel options in a dense corridor like Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. The situation is fairly common, a range of flights from point A to point B (Yogyakarta to Jakarta in this case), others from point B to points C, D and E (Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok), then a final set of flights from points C, D and E to point F, the destination of Phuket. It could have been more complicated if I added Penang as an intermediate point, but I decided to keep it "simple" and not do that.

There are different ways of presenting this information, but I decided that the most efficient was to used the intermediate points as the name for the routes representing different combinations of flights. That gives me Bangkok 1 to 3, Kuala Lumpur 1 to 8 and Singapore 1 to 4. So that means that all routes start with YOG to CGK, B routes go CGK to BKK and then BKK to HKT, C routes go CGK to KUL, then KUL to HKT and D routes go CGK to SIN and then SIN HKT. Here is my spreadsheet of this information (please note that there are many flights at in-between times left out, as they are quite numerous; what I show is that last flight that can make a 50 minute connection; also for the few that are publically available the actual flight times for June 24, 2011 were used):

The flight from Taipei to Jakarta was reported to be the next one at 830am. The first flight was CI 5855 departing at 805am, arriving at 1205pm. There was another China Airlines flight scheduled for about 40 minutes later, which I don;t think the teams were on.

I would guess that teams were on CL761 which left at 8:58 and arrived at 13:21.

For the beginning of leg 5, teams will have to get from Krabi to Bangkok. Depending on exactly how AR19 producers have worded the clue, it is quite possible that teams might be taking an overnight bus for the 500 km between Krabi and Bangkok. Here are the possible bus options:

We never circled back to put all the pieces together in and out of Malawi. Here they are:

June 30 BKK JNB TG703 0108 0700

June 30 JNB LLW SA170 0959 1207

For July 2 after the 2 legs in Malawi I checked whether it was possible to get out from Blantyre to Nairobi. It isn't. There is SA173 to Johannesburg, but it arrives well after the flight below and isn't likely to have been part of the exit route from Africa.

July 2 KL566 NBO AMS 2241 0553+1, which arrived on the morning of July 3rd and offered many possibilities to connect to either Brussels or Copenhagen. There were no nonstops available to either Brussels or Copenhagen departing July 2, but SN453 was a late evening flight to Brussels on July 3.

Above flight works well with KQ 732 from Lilongwe to Nairobi via Lusaka (2 Jul 2355-0105 to Lusaka, 3 Jul 0205-0545 to Nairobi).

After KQ 116 from NBO-AMS (0810-1555), teams can connect (if they're allowed to use the airline) to Cimber Sterling QI 3534, 1915-2055, or the more mainstream SAS SK 554, 2020-2145, to get to Copenhagen. Hours of Operation to pass the night, then race the next day (4 Jul).

There's been speculation that the teams might have taken buses from Phuket to Bangkok; if so, that would be the obverse of season one when teams (or at least Bill and Joe) took buses from Bangkok to Krabi , right?

I can't seem to find SK1550 for Sunday July 3rd. It does show up for Saturday July 2nd though.

And the flight through Cairo leaves Nairobi too early for the 5:45 am arrival from Lusaka/Lilongwe.

The departure from Nairobi to Cairo is easily accomplished if teams are on KQ731 LLW NBO July 1200 1510. I see the teams as finally spreading out a bit, with some making that and others having to wait for KQ732 LLW NBO 2355 0545+1 via Lusaka.

I had checked on Sk1550, but on rechecking it, you are right; it did not exist on July 3.

Based on the boarding pass, the NBO-AMS sighting, and the Hillerod spoiler, we know this is one of the flights teams took:KQ 732, KQ 116, then QI 3534 (or similar) from Lilongwe to Lusaka to Nairobi to Amsterdam to Copenhagen, 2 Jul 2355 to 3 Jul 2055

Here's what we assumed following the Milan spoiler:ET 870, ET 708, then SK 1690 (or similar) from Lilongwe to Addis Ababa to Milan MXP to Milan LIN to Copenhagen, 4 Jul 1505 to 5 Jul 0835This routing is unlikely, however, because teams leave Malawi and arrive in Denmark much, much later (more than a day) than the other flight we know.

Here are the fastest options via Addis Ababa on the 3rd. It's through Paris or Rome, which would mean the spoiler met the teams from Addis Ababa to Paris/Rome, then split ways at the French/Italian capital, our spoiler heading to Milan and the teams headed to Copenhagen:ET 876, ET 704, then AF 1750 from Lilongwe to Addis Ababa to Paris to Copenhagen, 3 Jul 1505 to 4 Jul 0920ET 876, ET 702, LH 243, then SK 640 from Lilongwe to Addis Ababa to Rome to Frankfurt to Copenhagen, 3 Jul 1505 to 4 Jul 1055The problem is that there's a faster flight even if teams miss our established 2355 to Nairobi:KQ 724, KL 566, then SK 550 from Lilongwe to Nairobi to Amsterdam to Copenhagen, 3 Jul 1315 to 4 Jul 0820

That leaves a Milan flight itinerary that arrives earlier than the Amsterdam route:ET 871, ET 708, then U2 2655 (or similar) from Lilongwe to Addis Ababa to Milan MXP to Copenhagen, 2 Jul 1505 to 3 Jul 1105It's the most likely Milan route at the moment given the information we have, but it arrives in Copenhagen so early (11.05am as opposed to 8.55pm) that we need to have a contrived Hours of Operation to balance teams out.

And just because we can, here's a map to make everything even more confusing!

What are the assumptions we are making? Did we take a leap of logic somewhere?

« Last Edit: October 21, 2011, 12:37:11 AM by Neobie »

Logged

Found out that Neobie in Chinese means "f*king awesome"! No, really. Look it up!

Well, the thing is that the NBO AMS flight does not work if you are constrained to leave Malawi on July 3rd. And now we know that the NBO AMS flight is solid. So it follows that Teams had to leave Lilongwe on July 2nd. I was thinking we had an airport siting in Lilongwe that supported this.

I think the information we have shows that leg started late enough in the day of July 2nd to cause teams to miss both the noon flight to NBO and the 3:05 pm flight to Addis Ababa.

I did report that Teams parked their cars overnight, July 3rd, in the churchyard of Von Frelsers Kirke in Copenhagen. The Hours of Operation lifted at 7:30 am the next day on July 4th.

One was from an on the ground spotter who shared that teams were scheduled to depart the 3rd. I was unable to get further clarification when I asked about the 2nd, but the source is highly knowledgable, and ALL other info was 100% reliable.

The other was surmised from this...but there is nothing to say that the tweet dated the third could not have actually been referring to a flight on the 2nd. Was unable to get further info.

The following flights are the best combinations to leave Lilongwe on the 3rd, all arriving in Copenhagen after the Hours of Operation have lifted. Teams missing the flight we have through Lusaka, Nairobi and Amsterdam will have to wait more than 13h for the next flight:Lilongwe to Nairobi (1315-1625)Nairobi to Amsterdam (2230-0540)Amsterdam to Copenhagen (0655-0820)

If tickets are sold out or teams happen to be so incompetent they fall more than 14h behind the lead team, they can catch up with this itinerary with risky connections:Lilongwe to Addis Ababa (1505-1945)Addis Ababa to Bahrain (2255-0025)Bahrain to Frankfurt (0115-0640)Frankfurt to Copenhagen (0735-0855)

The safer itinerary for these incompetent teams is:Lilongwe to Addis Ababa (1505-1945)Addis Ababa to Paris (2345-0630)Paris to Copenhagen (0730-0920)

Only this third itinerary is plausible for teams who wish to bump into the spoiler travelling from Ethiopia to Italy. But this means we'd have to assume that they fell 14h or more behind the lead teams in Malawi.

As mentioned above, the fourth itinerary that leaves Lilongwe on 2 Jul would mean Hours of Operation begin at the very contrived time of noon, lasting until the next morning. So either 1) some teams are so fast we'd need a crazy Hours of Operation or 2) some teams are so slow they fall way behind. It's pretty difficult to reconcile the Milan spoiler...

Logged

Found out that Neobie in Chinese means "f*king awesome"! No, really. Look it up!